| Abstract No.: | 315 |
| Country: | Canada |
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| Title: | DOPAMINE MEDIATES THE AVERSIVE EFFECTS OF OPIATES AND NICOTINE BUT THE REWARDING EFFECTS OF ALCOHOL |
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| Authors/Affiliations: | 1 Derek van der Kooy*;
1 University of Toronto, ON, Canada
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| Content: | In drug naive animals, neither neuroleptics nor mutations of dopamine receptors have any effects on the rewarding effects of opiates or nicotine in the conditioned place preference paradigm. For both drugs, the rewarding effects in previously drug naive animals are mediated by the TPP nucleus of the brainstem. Indeed, neuroleptics and dopamine receptor mutations instead block the naive aversive effects of opiates and nicotine. Although dopamine blockade does abolish the conditioned place preferences for opiates in opiate dependent and withdrawn animals, this effect may be conceptualized as primarily a block of the aversive effects of withdrawal, and in so far as the aversive effects of withdrawal are blocked, there can be little reward from opiates alleviating these aversive effects. Nevertheless, dopamine does have a direct role in the rewarding effects of alcohol in drug naive animals in the place conditioning paradigm. We suggest that different patterns of dopamine activation can signal either rewarding or aversive effects; indeed, ventral tegmental GABA neurons control directly the motivational effects of the adjacent ventral tegmental dopamine neurons. |
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